Articles by Muhammad Jarir Kanji

The initiative may also stop U.S. companies from offering their apps on Chinese companies’ marketplaces.

What you need to know

The Trump administration today launched another salvo in its ongoing soft war against China.
An expansion of the Clean Network program may see Chinese apps banned from the Play Store and iOS App Store.
U.S. companies may also be prohibited from using cloud services from the likes of Tencent and Baidu.

In a move that is likely to further increase hostilities between the two nations, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo today announced an expansion of the Trump’s administration’s Clean Network program against “malign actors,” though the target of these measures is clear: China.

Referring to the Chinese Community Party as a “malign actor” and Chinese carriers as “untrusted,” the announcement outlines a plan to “clean” various aspects of the IT infrastructure in the U.S. Most notable among these may be the Clean Store and Clean Apps initiatives, which may se…

The changes are part of YouTube’s ongoing feature experiments program.

What you need to know

YouTube is experimenting with its UI on the Android, web, and TV apps.
The Android experiment adds a more prominent search bar to the top of the app.
Web and TV users, meanwhile, may see sign-in prompts if they’re accessing YouTube without their Google account.

In the name of science — or perhaps profits, who knows? — YouTube is running a few UI experiments on its apps across different platforms. As Android Police reports, the company has made some changes to the Android, TV, and web apps, though only a small number of people are being tapped for these tests, so you likely won’t see them on your end.

The first of these is a new search bar in the YouTube app on Android. In the app’s current UI, the search icon in the top right expands into a full-fledged search bar when you click on it. In the new design, an already-expanded search bar is featured prominently in the top left of the…

It’s only available in the U.S. and South Korea for now.

What you need to know

Samsung today announced a new closed beta for One UI 3.0 aimed at developers.
It’s only available to Galaxy S20 devices in the U.S. and South Korean at the moment.
An open beta available in more countries is set to follow sometime later.

In addition to the launch of its latest flagships, Samsung delighted its fans today with the launch of a new beta program for the next iteration of its custom Android skin, which will be based on Android 11 (via XDA Developers). The One UI 3.0 ‘pre-beta’ is only available to Galaxy S20, S20+, and S20 Ultra devices in the U.S. and South Korea.

The program is currently in the closed beta stage, what Samsung calls the ‘pre-beta’, and will require you to sign up for entry. Samsung’s announcement page does quite clearly state it’s targeting developers with this beta, and you’ll need to sign up to become a “Samsung partner developer” to join. So if you’re just a regular Jo…

The country has already banned TikTok, WeChat, and more.

What you need to know

India has expanded its list of banned Chinese apps
The new additions include Xiaomi’s Mi Browser Pro, Tencent’s QQ International, and Baidu’s search apps.
It’s reportedly considering bans on PUBG and hundreds of other apps.

India’s campaign against Chinese apps continues. Having already banned 59 apps back in June, the country has, in the last few weeks, followed up with 47 more bans on apps that sought to mimic the original apps.

Now, the country’s government is bringing down the ban hammer again on an unknown number of new apps, including Xiaomi’s Mi Browser Pro, the English version of Tencent’s QQ chat app, and some of Baidu’s search apps, reports Reuters.

Unlike the original bans, the Indian government chose to forego publicly disclosing the latest string of bans, so it’s unclear just how many apps have been affected. The country was previously reported to be considering bans on up to 275 more a…

The company couldn’t find any evidence that hackers had used the vulnerability.

What you need to know

Twitter today disclosed a vulnerability in its Android app.
The security flaw could have allowed attackers to access a user’s private information, including their DMs.
The company claims only about 4% of its userbase on Android is vulnerable.

A vulnerability in Twitter’s Android app, based on an underlying flaw in Android itself that was disclosed back in 2018, could have allowed malicious actors to access a user’s personal information, Twitter reported today.

The issue only affected users on Android 8 and 9, and by Twitter’s estimates, 96% of its user base on Android already have the relevant security patches installed on their device that safeguard them from this exploit. To protect the remaining 4% of users — which the company calls a ‘small group’, despite having a billion downloads on the Play Store — Twitter announced that it’s doing the following:

Updated Twit…

The company’s troubles with moving to a 5nm process may be to blame.

What you need to know

A rumor from earlier this year suggested Qualcomm had tagged Samsung to manufacture its upcoming Snapdragon 875G SoC.
A new report out of China now suggests that the company may have lost those orders to Taiwanese rival TSMC.
Issues with Samsung’s 5nm process are reportedly to blame.

Samsung’s semiconductor division may have just lost a major piece of business from Qualcomm. The company was previously expected to be responsible for manufacturing Qualcomm’s next-gen X60 5G modems, as well as an upgraded variant of its next flagship SoC, the Snapdragon 865G.

A new report out of China (via GizmoChina), however, suggests the company may have lost most, if not all, of that business to Taiwanese rival TSMC. The new chips were to be built using Samsung’s new 5nm EUV process, but as the Note 20 series’ launch with the Exynos 990, and not the 5nm Exynos 992 that we were expecting, shows, Samsung 5…

The carrier’s 5G network now reaches 250 million people across the U.S.

What you need to know

T-Mobile today boasted of being the first in the world to launch a nationwide standalone 5G network.
The bump to a standalone architecture improves the network’s coverage and performance indoors.
According to T-Mobile, the upgrade expands coverage by 30% to include 2,000 more cities across the U.S.

Following up on its promise of dragging the industry forward, kicking and screaming, T-Mobile today announced a major upgrade to its nationwide 5G network by turning on its standalone architecture.

The upgrade, which T-Mobile boasts makes it the first in the world, expands the Un-carrier’s 5G coverage by up to 30%, covering 2,000 more cities for a total of 7,500 cities and towns across 1.3 million square miles, reaching 250 million people across the U.S.

Standalone here implies the 5G network can operate independently of the company’s 4G LTE network, which is how other carriers’ implementat…

Ads may even show up on the lock screen.

What you need to know

According to a new report, Samsung may be experimenting with ads in One UI.
Leaked images allegedly taken from One UI 2.5 show ads on the lock screen and within Samsung’s stock apps.
While Samsung’s flagships will, of course, be spared, the company may choose to subsidize its A- and M-series phones this way.

Launched early last year, One UI represented a big change for Samsung’s design language for its Android UI, with an emphasis on a cleaner, less noisy layout. The company followed up on the new Android interface with One UI 2.0 and 2.1 earlier this year, and now the next version, One UI 2.5., may represent yet another shakeup in the company’s philosophy for Android — and not in a good way.

If an alleged leaked image of the upcoming update to One UI received by TizenHelp is to be believed, the company is taking a page from Xiaomi’s book and experimenting with embedding ads within stock apps as well as within t…

The Galaxy Fold 5G, however, will need to wait a while longer.

What you need to know

Samsung is now propagating the June 2020 security patch to Galaxy Fold devices.
The update comes mere days after the Galaxy S20, S10, and Note 10 series began receiving the update.
The rollout for the 5G variant of the phone, however, has yet to start.

Yet another month, yet another security patch for Android devices. This time around, it’s the June 2020 security patch, and the latest phone to be graced by it is Samsung’s Galaxy Fold. The build number for the update is F900FXXS3BTE1, if that’s the kind of thing that interests you (via SamMobile).

While this update contains no new features to speak of, Samsung did, just a month ago, port over some of the best new camera features of the Galaxy S20 series — such as Single Task and the Pro video mode — over to the foldable phone.

Unfortunately, however, while regular Galaxy Folds should have started receiving the OTA update already, the Galaxy…

The two features combined can automate some of your writing duties.

What you need to know

Months after their availability on G Suite, Autocorrect and Smart Compose for Google Docs are finally making their way to G Suite for Education and Nonprofits.
Autocorrect automatically correct any spelling and grammatical errors in your writing.
Smart Compose, meanwhile, uses machine learning to suggest the rest of the sentence based on what you’ve written.

It’s been over six months since Google first started testing Smart Compose and Autocorrect in Google Docs and over four months since the feature was made widely available to G Suite users in general, but the company has finally brought the features to G Suite for Education and Nonprofits.

First revealed for Gmail, Smart Compose uses machine learning for automatic sentence completion based on the current phrase you’re typing in. The feature, Google says, is aimed at ‘cutting back on repetitive writing while reducing the chance of spelli…